Tracking Cargo is a Growing Concern

There is a question I hear numerous times between the Shipper and Cargo Owner, do you track the container or the cargo ?

The common dominator to move cargo will always be the container, carriers seek visibility of their assets, and over the last few years, we have witnessed several tier-one operators introduce intelligent tags to track their complete container fleets.

The liners, embrace data from these tags to incorporate within their equipment management they provide rudimentary data to their shipper clientele. Carriers provide key milestone check points for the shipper this data could include :-

• Allocated Units against a Booking
• Container Number / Size / Type
• Drop off at Shippers premises
• Pick Up data / time
• Inland Move (Road / Rail / Barge)
• Enter Terminal (Export Load)
• Load Vessel
• Sea Voyage
• Discharge Port
• Pick up Unit (Import Load) (Road / Rail / Barge)
• Gate in Move - Distribution Center / Shipper facilities

At this point the carrier is interested in the following :-

• Time at the Distribution Center (Demurrage charges)
• Empty Pick Up
• Drop off at an MT Depot

The carriers believe by providing asset tracking they can better optimize their fleet, improve turn-times and monitor dwell times.

From an operational stand point the carriers want tags to provide :-

• Container Number
• IICL Data
• Size / Type / YOM
• Manufacturers Details
• Tare Weights
• Damage Management

The carriers look to optimize their fleets achieve better utilization, and reduce their wastage across their containers.

However, if we speak to the Cargo owners they require a more detailed analysis of their shipments. The Shippers want to continually improve their supply chain, cutting down losses and wastage that costs the industry billions every year.

The shippers want to track data such as :-

• Date and Time stamped when packed
• Container Details (Prefix Number)
• Container Pick Up Time
• Hinterland Move - (Truck / Rail / Barge)
• Port / Terminal Entry
• Vessel Loading / Vessel Arrival
• Import Pick Up / Cleared Port / Terminal
• Hinterland Move (Truck / Rail / Barge)

The added Value the Shipper seeks will include :-

• Temperature and humidity monitoring
• Cargo Details
• Delay Occurrences'
• Intrusion detector
• Unexpected delays or stoppages

Today Data has greater value than gold these days, especially when trillions of dollars of shipments get moved annually. But still Shippers pick and choose what cargo they should track and what they feel is unessential.

They see cargo such as :-

• Fresh Produce
• Alcohol
• Electronics
• Chemicals
• Pharma
• Machinery

These are key cargo that warrant tagging and tracking.

The current market size of intelligent cargo tags is currently valued at around $6.0 billion; experts predict it will grow to $16 billion by 2029. Solution providers vary significantly from basic RFID tags, to bar code and optical scanning capabilities. The more advanced use real-time data stream pinging satellites and providing visibility across the chain. Other groups are moving towards the disposal SIM cards that connect and transmit data via 4 and 5 G cellular networks. Linking to mapping and navigational systems, cargo can be real-time tracked.

Of course cellular networks can vary significantly from geographical regions, so most of these tags still capture the data and provide data uploads once the network comes back into play.

So why should shippers and forwarders embrace intelligent tagging cross their global freight moves the argument is compelling and key benefits can include :-

• Reduction of Cargo Loss / damage.
• Reduction in Freight Insurances.
• Analysis of where delays can occur within the supply chain.
• Performance monitoring of the carrier or forwarder service levels.
• Monitoring temperature spikes focusing on when and where these incidences occurred.
• Tracking inventory and delivery times.

So how do these types of solutions perform:-

• Reliability and durability are essential to ensure that the tags can stand up to freight moves.
• The ability to plan your operational touch points, when, where, and frequency of when the data is transmitted.
• Assessing the performance of the supply chain routes.

Data can be harnessed and shared from these tag groups' propriety dashboards that comply and provide analytical data to analyses. API's and data integration can also allow for data to stream to customers' supply chain solutions for analytical processing.

Last week, I had the pleasure of speaking to a leading CEO and Co-Founder of Moeco a fast-paced European-based Cargo tagging company. It was refreshing to see where cargo monitoring is heading with better analytics and the introduction of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning applications.

The sector is moving towards using data to model and tweak Supply Chain routes more efficiently, cutting down on waste and improving performance and gaining higher yields on every piece of cargo being moved.

Other significant benefits in improving supply chain is reducing carbon emissions and as new Government taxes on emissions are being introduced shippers and carriers can work together to streamline the flow of cargo and containers.

Smart tracking of cargo is here to stay and the market growth clearly highlights the massive spike in the use and deployment of next-generation trackers.

With world trade becoming even more fluid the time to tag your cargo is becoming key to ensure that your global supply chains stay competitive and cost efficient.

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For more information please drop me a line

Richard Butcher

Managing Director - GEM Ltd

[email protected]

www.gemglobal.org